The Monkhayic family of languages, though now restricted to Kebri and the southwestern corner of Dhekhnam, was once spoken throughout the Plain, and indeed has left its linguistic traces heavily on the map of the Plain. The Mishicama ocean, the Ctelm mountains, the Svetla, Menla, Vesi, Meuna, and Efrat rivers, the nations of Ismahi, Azgami, Koto, Melináe, and Érenat, lake Como, the Arosd delta, and the cities of Kebropol, Lädau, Avéla, Ydamai, Raizumi, Nuveta, Kereta, Mituré, Gödo, Mogör, Melahdo, Trezhda, Mabola, and Pelym all have Monkhayic names.

The first states of men in the Plain were Monkhayic: Como and Methaiu on the upper Svetla, established about Z.E. -1150. By the time they appeared, men had lived in the Plain for twenty thousand years, and the Monkhayic peoples were divided into dozens of mutually incompatible languages.

Civilization and trade spread the prestigious dialects of the cities, and just before the Eastern invasion we are aware of three major speech varieties: that of Okiami and Methaiu in the south, that of Davur along the lower Svetla, and that of Agimbea and Newor along the Serea and the Mishicama littoral.

The Easterners pushed the Monkhayic peoples (those who were not absorbed) north and east (-375). Refugees from Davur established the kingdom of Davrio on Kebri.

Most of these lands were conquered by Munkhâsh (440), except for the littoral (reorganized as Leziunea) and Kebri.

The continental Monkhayic peoples (and, for about two centuries, even Kebri) were incorporated into the Cadhinorian empire as it pushed back and ultimately destroyed Munkhâsh (1667), and though the Monkhayic languages persisted throughout the entire classical area, colonization and Cadhinorization eventually replaced Monkhayic languages everywhere except two areas, Kebri (plus some regions of Érenat and, till recently, the island of Koto) and Monkhay, the mountainous southwestern corner of Dhekhnam.

The relationship between Kebreni and Monkhayu (both the languages and the peoples) has been obscured by long isolation. In addition, Kebreni has been highly influenced by Cadhinor, Ismaîn, and Verdurian, and has borrowed from languages further afield, the Kebreni being great seafarers; while Monkhayu is heavily influenced by Dhekhnami, Caizuran, and Sarroc.

"Monkhayu", which has given its name to the language family, simply means "the people"; compare Kebreni neh'ada.

This grammatical sketch concentrates on Kebreni, but also relates what is known of its ancestor, the Monkhayic language of the littoral.

Following Verdurian scholars, we will call it Methaiun, after the state of Methaiu-- although the language of pre-invasion Methaiu was actually a southern Monkhayic language.

This is certainly the most rickety of the ancient languages presented in this volume, not excluding proto-Eastern. To begin with, there are no direct ancient attestations; the Monkhayic peoples were illiterate, and remained so till the Cadhinorians conquered them. The problem is compounded by the extreme distance between Monkhayu and Kebreni; only a few hundred cognates can be identified.

Our sources for Methaiun are as follows:

Attestations from ancient Cuzeian and Cadhinorian sources: lines of poetry, borrowed words, names of historical figures, word lists from the few Cadhinorian writers who interested themselves in the peoples of the littoral or of Sarnáe.

Place names, attested in ancient or modern times.

Reconstructions based on the dialects of Kebreni, which are quite divergent, especially in the remoter areas: Kernoia, the valleys of Érenat, and Koto (whose language still has uses in the courts and temples).

Information from Monkhayu.

Note that reconstruction based on Kebreni and Monkhayu gives not Methaiun but proto-Monkhayic, which predates it by two milennia or more.

Methaiun may be taken as an idealized form of the Monkhayic language of Kebri and the littoral, some time before the Munkhâshi invasion. I say 'idealized' because none of our sources are completely satisfactory. The Cadhinorians were not linguists, and adapted the Monkhayic words to the sounds of Cadhinor in order to write them down; while the reconstructions are biased toward the eastern area. Still, the overlap of the two methods is large and reassuring, and where divergences are systematic they can be taken as belonging to western and eastern dialects of Methaiun.

Kebreni is written using the Verdurian alphabet. The orthographic representations of the above sounds are as follows.

c is a true palatal stop /c/, and should not be confused with any sort of affricate.

s', though it's written using the Verdurian sh, is a dorso-prepalatal fricative [s;], the same as the Polish s' or Chinese x. One recipe for producing it is to start with a sh and adding more palatal friction to it-- say sh, think [ç]. z' is the voiced equivalent.

The h is pronounced as in English (and Old Verdurian), while h' is a palatal fricative /ç/, as in German ich.

k is pronounced like a Verdurian c /k/, not a k /q/. Kebreni has sensibly used Cadhinor's two back stop symbols for two points of articulation, but the points are moved up a stop.

Doubled consonants (as in linna 'lord') are drawn out, as in English pen knife, not penny.

Stress is placed on the last syllable if it ends in a consonant, otherwise on the second-to-last vowel: Kébri, Kebropól, pah'ár, Leléc, s'aída, nizy'ru, Raazám, my'gu, paús'te, kulséu, ingaréi. Since stress is completely predictable, it is never indicated orthographically.

Kebreni is a syllable-timed language-- one where each syllable takes up an equal amount of time-- rather than a stress-timed one like English, where stresses occur at roughly equal intervals. Unstressed syllables in Kebreni retain their clear vowel sounds.

The sounds of Methaiun are reconstructed as follows:

labial

dental

palatal

velar

vowels

stops

p

t

k

i

u

b

d

g

fricatives

f

th s

ch

kh

e

o

v

z

j

gh

nasals

m

n

a

liquids

l r

semivowel

w

This schema should be viewed as our best guess; it is certainly wrong in spots, and phonetic interpretations are quite uncertain.

We really have no idea how ch was pronounced. The Kebreni reflex is s'. We use ch because this is its reflex in Verdurian names inherited from Methaiun. In Cadhinor it was usually written t, tr, or ts, suggesting a palatal stop or affricate.

Only verbs (including predicate adjectives) have a true inflectional morphology; nouns and attributive adjectives are not inflected, and the remnants of inflection among the pronouns are not synchronically salient. However, there is a productive derivational morphology.

Kebreni verb inflection is quite different from that of the Eastern languages such as Verdurian. Verbs are not inflected for person, number, or tense. Rather, the chief categories of inflection are aspect, politeness, volition, and effect.

In addition, inflection is accomplished by vowel interchange, vowel change, and infixing, not by affixation.

Aspect (imperfective and perfective)

The citation form of the verb is the imperfective:

kanu I see, you see, he was seeing...
diru I work, you work, he was working...
sudy I am called, you are called...

The final -u is not part of the root; it's a grammatical ending. It dissimilates to -y when the last vowel of the root is u, as in sudy.

To form the perfective you switch the last two vowels. (This relationship holds for all the other forms described below, as well.)

kuna I have seen, I saw...
duri I have worked, you worked...
sydu I was once called...

Perfective forms are used for completed actions, no matter what time they occur. Thus you'd use the imperfect diru for "I was working", because you weren't done yet; and the perfective kuna for "I will read it", if you mean you'll read it and finish.

An explicit time may always be indicated with adverbs:

Pah'ar kanu pol. Tomorrow you will see the city.
Pah'ar kuna pol. Tomorrow you will have seen (everything in) the city.

Note that Kebreni transitive or ditransitive verbs, used with one less noun phrase, express a passive meaning. Thus

Melah' kuna neku. The king saw the cat.
Neku kuna. The cat was seen.

Nyne h'ouz'i aisel. The girl lost the key.
Aisel h'ouzi. The key is lost.

Volition

To form the volitional, add an initial e, voice the initial consonant (if any), then switch the first two vowels (that is, the added e- plus what was the first vowel of the root). A final -y returns to -u.

agenu I intend to see, I will see, see! (volitional, uncompleted action)
agune I intended to see, I will have seen (volitional, completed action)

ideru I intend to work, I will see, work!
idure I intended to work, I will have worked...

uzedu I intend to call, I intend to be called...
uzude I intended to call / no longer be called...

The volitional forms emphasize that the agent consciously intends the action (imperfective) or the result (perfective).

Polite forms

karynu I see, you see, he sees (uncompleted action)
kurina I have seen, you've seen, he's seen (completed action)

agerynu I intend to see, I will see, see! (volitional, uncompleted action)
agurine I intended to see, I will have seen (volitional, completed action)

Polite forms express deference toward a superior, or politeness to an equal. They are used with nobles and royalty, employers, military superiors, parents, in-laws, teachers, and so on. In addition the middle and upper classes use it with each other; but man and wife, siblings or cousins, or very close friends do not.

H'em cyryru? Do I know you, sir?
Alerihu! Please come!

Note that the politeness applies to the listener, not to the referent.

Polite forms are made by inserting -ri- within the verb root, before the last consonant; -ry- if the vowel in the next syllable is a u. The infix may divide a consonant cluster: kulsu 'command' --> kulrysu.

In addition there are a few suppletive forms; e.g. badu 'eat' has the polite form sehepu; tasu 'do' has the polite form soru, and so on. (Do not add -ri- to the suppletive forms; they are already polite.)

Positive effect

The benefactive implies that the given action benefits the speaker in some way:

keni someone sees, to my benefit
deri someone works for me
sidi someone is called, and it helps or flatters me
sythi someone provides to me

It is formed by fronting the stem vowel (a --> e, o -->e; u --> y, y --> i,i --> e, e unchanged) and changing the final -u to -i. The perfective, volitional, and polite forms are formed according to the usual rules.

The stem vowel is the last vowel of the root; e.g. pansyru 'someone kisses' --> pansiri 'someone kisses me'. (Verbs with stem y, like this one, have identical perfective and imperfective.)

To indicate that the action was performed for the benefit of the listener, the infix -ni- is added before the final consonant of the root:

kenini someone sees, to your benefit
deniri someone works for you

Compare:

H'azum diru keda. Hazum is working on the house.
H'azum deri keda. Hazum is working on my house.
H'azum deniri keda. Hazum is working on your house.

Kulseu nuzi melah'. The commander spoke to the King. (from nizu, speak)
Kulseu nize melah'. The commander spoke to the King on my behalf.
Kulseu ninize melah'. The commander spoke to the King on your behalf.

Negative effect

The antibenefactive implies that the given action harmed the speaker in some way. It's very common in the mouths of Kebrenis and essential for mastering colloquial speech.

adery someone purposely worked against me
oseda they purposely call him that to spite me

loriha someone is coming to harm me (polite form)

It is formed by backing the stem vowel (a --> o, e --> o, i --> y; y --> u, u --> o, o unchanged) and changing the final -u to -a. The perfective, volitional, and polite forms are formed according to the usual rules.

The subordinating form is used when there is another verb in the sentence. It's formed by moving the final vowel of the verb before the final consonant and adding -te. A labial stop becomes dental
and a voiced stop becomes unvoiced before the -te
(so m --> n, p/b/d --> t, g --> c, z --> s, etc.).

This form has several uses. One is with auxiliary verbs, or any verb which takes another verb as a possible object. The -te form appears before the main verb, and after its objects:

Melah' kaunte elecu. The king is able to see you.
Kulseu gorkreha kaunte maru. The commander is probably reading the ledger.

Tarautte hilu? Do you like to dance?
H'em diurte luha. I came (in order) to work.

The negative in Kebreni is an auxiliary verb, es'u (polite natu):

H'em H'azum cyurtees'u. I don't know Hazum.

H'azum kulseu kriuh'teus'e. Hazum won't kill the commander tomorrow.

Pah'ar lauhtenatu? Aren't you coming tomorrow? (polite)

Note that volitional, politeness, and aspect inflections normally apply only to the main verb. One can make such finicky distinctions as the following--

diurte lahu was/is coming to be working
diurte luha came to be working
duirte lahu was/is coming to work (and finish)
duirte luha came to work (and finish)
diurte alehu is intending to come to work
iderute lahu is coming intending to work

--but these are rare even in writing; normally only the base form (i.e. diurte) is used, and inflections are applied only to the auxiliary. Semantically, they are considered to apply to the auxiliary + verb combination-- e.g. for diurte alehu the intention is taken to apply to both the coming and the working; while for diurte luha the entire action-- coming to work-- is taken as being completed.

Another usage of the -te form is as a gerund or modifier. The subordinated verb suggests the manner in which the main action was performed, or simply names a following or resulting action.

Finally -te is used to form relative clauses. In this usage volitional, aspect, and effect inflections (but not politeness infixes) can be applied to the subordinating form. Note that the clause precedes the modified noun.

Neh'at duri keda. The man worked on the house -->
[Diurte keda] neh'at alehu pahar.[work-SUB house] man come-VOL tomorrow
The man [who worked on the house] will come tomorrow.

Kulseu nazy neh'at. The commander spoke against me to the man -->
[Kulseu nayste] neh'at sudy Kalum.[commander spoke-ANTIB-SUB] man name Kalum
The man [the commander spoke to against me] is named Kalum.

There is no relativizing pronoun. Note that if the subordinated verb is preceded by a subject, as in the last two sentences, the head of the clause must be taken as a direct or indirect object; if the verb begins the clause, as in the first example, the head must be the subject of the clause. Schematically:

NP Vte NP = [S V] O
Vte NP NP = [V O] S

If the head noun refers to a place or time, the phrase is equivalent to a when or where clause in English-- again, these pronouns do not appear in Kebreni:

[vaac mygu moiutte] hah'cthe valley [where the blue ox was found]

[pocuste melah'] re the day [when I kicked the King]

Conjugation table

For complex forms, form the (anti)benefactive first, then the volitional, then the perfective, then the listener suffix -ni, then (if there's no suppletive form) the polite -ri-, then the subordinating -te.

Ellipses indicate that variations (the imperfective and the two volitional forms) are being left out.

There are three sets of pronouns in Kebreni, which imply contempt, neutrality, or deference toward the referent.

The pejorative first person forms (cin, z'um) are humilifics, used to refer to oneself when speaking with a superior; the remaining pejorative forms (kuh' and vuh'-- one does not bother with any number distinction) are used to refer to those of lower classes (or, of course, to insult someone by referring to them as inferiors).

The deferential second person form falau is an honorific, used to refer to a listener or listeners who are social superiors; its use roughly correlates with the use of the polite forms of verbs. Note that the third person forms (vep, vybu) express deference to the person referred to, not (unlike polite verbs) to the listener. There are no deferential first-person pronouns.

For all of these pronouns, possessive forms can be made by adding -te (which forces a preceding labial stop to assimilate): h'ente 'my (ordinary)', falaute 'your (deferential)', vuh'te 'his/her/its/theirs (pejorative)'.

It must be emphasized that pronouns are optional, and indeed to be avoided, in Kebreni. They are used only when necessary for clarity. For direct address, in fact, it's preferable to use honorifics and titles:

Linna, agenu gembadi? Lord, [do you] want [your] breakfast?

Demonstratives

'This' and 'that', as adjectives, are gem and kuri (the relation to 'one' and 'two' is obvious, but the direction of semantic borrowing is not!): gem nyne 'this woman', kuri palaz'nu 'that thorn-bush'.

As standalone pronouns these become gente 'this one' and kurite 'that one'. (This is actually a standard nominalizing use of the clitic -te with adjectives.)

To pluralize a noun, you follow the formula (X)V1C(V2) --> (X)V1C[+vcd]V1. The status of pluralization in Kebreni is quite different from languages such as Verdurian and English, where it is obligatory and grammaticalized. It is an optional derivation in Kebreni; it can be thought of as forming a collective noun-- 'a unit formed by more than one X.'

-ec has about the same meaning, but specifically names a feminine referent. Kebreni is usually not concerned to do so (e.g. melah' means both king and queen), but may use -ec in a few cases where the occupation is chiefly female (e.g. mah'ec 'prostitute') or where it's desired to refer to a couple without awkwardness-- e.g. a dance manual describing a duet may refer to the taradeu and taradec. The suffix is most commonly used to form girls' names.

lele 'cute, pretty' --> Lelec lezu 'forest' --> Lezec

Methaiun -(gh)umi, whose Kebreni reflex is -um, named someone who lives in a particular place; it's related to ghami 'land': thus limighumi 'highlander'. As a productive prefix, it has been replaced by -eu in Kebreni; but -um is still found in personal names and in inhabitant-names of very old cities:

The proprietor or manager of such a place is named with the suffix -areu (unless there already exists a simple form with -eu, e.g. sutheu 'provider, storekeeper'):

ingarei 'tavern' --> ingareu 'tavernkeeper'

From toponyms and nobles' names we learn of a vowel-harmonizing honorific prefix me- in Methaiun: Monkhado (Monkhayu), Michiaghama (Mishicama), meNeula (Menla), melekh 'king', myvun 'leader'. It's also seen in Methaiu, Meuna, Mevost, Meto:re. The prefix is not seen in modern Kebreni, and usually disappears in cognates: S'ahama 'Mishicama', neh'ada 'the people'.

Adjectivizers

The subordinator -te, attached to a single word, in effect turns it into an adjective.

A similar process can be seen in Meth. nauni 'young man', niune 'young woman' (but it's obscured by sound change in Kebreni: nen, nyne).

-iCa where -C is the final consonant of the root, or -eCa after -i-, means 'that has been Xed'. This sounds like a past participle, but it is never a verbal form, nor can it even be used predicatively; it can only be used to modify a noun, or as a nominalization.

To mark focus, a constituent is moved to the front of the sentence. With compound sentences, the constituent in focus may serve as subject and object both in the the sentence; context usually serves to keep the meaning clear, without any unusual syntax or the insertion of pronouns.

Note that when there are two noun phrases before the verb and no object after it, the first must be the object. If there's just one noun phrase before the verb, it's both subject and focus.

Hus nynete baba agenu z'e.As for the doctor, the girl's mother wants to see him too.

Nynete baba agenu hus z'e.As for the girl's mother, she wants to see the doctor too.

Neh'at guma mabu. Man bites dog. (focus unmarked or on 'man')

Mabu guma neh'at. Dog bites man. (focus unmarked or on 'dog')

Neh'at mabu guma. As for the man, the dog bit him. (focus on 'man')

Mabu neh'at guma. As for the dog, the man bit him. (focus on 'dog')

Schematically:

NP V = S V
V NP = V O
NP V NP = S V O
NP NP V = O S V

Indirect objects

Kebreni makes no morphological distinction between direct and indirect objects. One or both can appear after the verb, or be fronted for emphasis. The indirect object follows the direct object if both are given.

Kulseu h'uvy vez'a taradeu.The commander gave the bottle to the dancer.
Nyne mugeu h'uvy s'emu. The girl was given a fish by the young man.

S'emu nyne muh'a. As for the fish, the girl sold it.

Another way of putting this is that verbs like h'yvu 'give' are ditransitive in Kebreni, like sudy 'call (someone) (something)'.

Order

kur mabu two dogs
gem s'aida hazigai nyne that beautiful and proud maiden
thanih'te neh'at an annoying man
kaunte melah' mabu a dog that looks at a king
sivana s'aunte turgul the battalion near the desert

Kebreni's strong modifier-modified order would lead a linguist to suspect that it was once an OV language, which has changed, perhaps, under the influence of Verdurian. The evidence is equivocal; we do not have many actual texts in Methaiun. However, they do seem to be predominantly SOV.

The -te relativizer

The root meaning of -te is to reduce an expression to an attribute. It reduces a noun or noun phrase to an adjectival expression, a verbal expression to a subordinate clause.

With a single noun (or pronoun), a -te expression has an adjectival or possessive quality:

falaute gem one of you
tadate zevu father's friend
neh'adate nizarei the people's forum
kedate zivan the inside of the house (lit. the house's inside)

The same can be said of longer expressions that are themselves -te expressions:

falaute gente mygu the ox belonging to one of you
Kalunte tadate zevu Kalum's father's friend
neh'adatenizareite dirau the work of the people's forum

With more complex expressions -te functions like a relative clause:

dama rete ebdiru a three-day holiday; a holiday that's three days long
h'ulo tauste melah' a king who acts like an idiot
keda ziunte te mygu the ox that's in the house

Finally, a -te clause can stand on its own, meaning 'the one(s) which...':

Attributes

Predicates

As predicates they are a bit more complicated; in effect they are partially converted into verbs. No copula is used. In the simplest form, the adjective simply appears after the noun, in verbal position:

Krih'eu z'em. The killer is old.

The politeness infix -ri- must be used in the same situations it would be used on a verb:

Falte nyne s'aida. Your daughter is beautiful. (ordinary)

Falaute nyne s'airida. Your daughter is beautiful. (polite)

The predication is negated using the auxiliary es'u and the subordinator -te, as with verbs, and other auxiliaries may be used as well:

Gem mabu z'ente es'u. This dog is not old.

Melah' miryte maru. The king is probably rich.

Adjectives which already end in -te do not add it again:

Falau thanih'te erys'u! You are not annoying, sir!

A perfective can be formed by appending -u (replacing a final vowel if any) and interchanging it with the previous vowel. Use -y instead if the latter is also a -u-.

Adverbs

This form can follow the verb if it would not be confused with an object: nuzi hazikte is all right, but taradu nyylte would mean 'danced a slow one'. It can be fronted for emphasis, but only by placing it in its own subclause with tasu/soru 'do':

Kebreni has two ways of saying and, with slightly different meanings: eh'c, which appears between the conjoined constituents, and -ai, which attaches to the second constituent, voicing a final consonant and replacing the final vowel of a diphthong.

Applied to two (or more) modifiers, -ai forms an intersection, eh'c a union, of the meaning of the modifiers. For instance, muk syhai neh'at and muk eh'c syh neh'at both mean "the young and strong men"; but muk syhai neh'at means the men who are both young and strong (the intersection of 'young men' and 'strong men'), while muk eh'c syh neh'at means the young men and the strong men (the union of 'young men' with 'strong men').

The third logical possibility is a disjunction-- the men that are young or strong but not both-- and this corresponds to ga 'or': muk ga syh neh'at 'the old or the young men (but not both)'.

Similarly, applied to separate words, -ai implies that both conjoints describe the same referent(s) or action, eh'c that they are separate, and ga that only one applies:

H'em falaai inezu. You and I (as a unit or team) will speak.

(Here the referents are not the same. When the conjoints are obviously distinct, the meaning is that they form an indissoluble team, acting together.)

H'em eh'c falau inezu. You will speak, and I will speak.
H'em ga falau inezu. Either you will speak, or I will speak.

nyne taradeai the girl and the dancer (who are the same), the girl dancer
nyne eh'c taradeu the girl and the dancer (who are two separate people)
nyne ga taradeu the girl or the dancer (but not both)

Palec symalu thanih'uai. Palec bores and she annoys (all at once, simultaneously).
Palec symalu eh'c thanih'u. Palec bores and she also annoys (two different attributes).
Palec symalu ga thanih'u. Either Palec bores, or she annoys (not at the same time).

Ga is thus an exclusive or. There is no conjunction that has the meaning of inclusive or (X or Y or both, X and/or Y), but, as in English, one can add the 'and' case explicitly:

Melah' pabadu ga fanu ga kur soru. The king will laugh or die or both (lit. "or do the two (of them)").

There is no conjunction 'but'-- which, linguistically, is an 'and' with a built-in implication of surprise or contrast. These connotations must be explicitly indicated in Kebreni.

What we would express with prepositions is expressed using locative verbs in Kebreni, such as zinu 'be in or on', nevu 'be in the middle of'. These can be used as regular verbs:

Mygu zinu keda! The ox is inside the house!

Raazam neryvu hah'c. Raizumi is in the middle of the valley (polite).

Most of them in fact are regular verbs-- e.g. foru 'follow', used as a locative verb with the meaning 'be behind', mitu 'use' or 'be with'. The others were also once regular verbs, but are no longer used in their original meanings.

More frequently a locative expression is used as a modifier or an adverbial; these are subordinate clauses in Kebreni. The locative verb conventionally ends the expression, although its parameter is technically a direct object (more evidence, perhaps, for Methaiun's OV nature):

ingarei ziunte inside the tavern
re neuvte in the middle of the day

[h'ir zeveu eupte] lyr muhnu sad news [from an old friend]
[lim men fourte] keda the high hill [in back of the house]

[melah' miutte] linna the lords who support the king
[[kaldu ziunte] gem bakte kal ] h'ulo an idiot [without one fucking bee [in his hive]]

These expressions are so frequent that they are phonetically degraded. The -u- is often lost, or combines with a preceding -i- or -e- to form -y-, and the final -e may be lost as well, yielding such forms as zynt' 'inside' or fort' 'in back of'.

English has at least one verb that acts like a locative verb-- 'contain'. Kebreni locative verbs all act like 'contain'. Compare:

Kona zinu cih'ta

cih'ta ziunte

The money is in the box

in the box

Cih'ta zadinu kona

kona zadiunte

The box contains money

containing money

The most common locative verbs, and the abbreviations used in derivations from them, are shown below, with some examples:

brynu

bry

facing, before, about

keda bryunte 'in front of the house', kriidi bryunte about books'

dynu

dy

up, on top of, over

cadu dyunte 'over the mountains'

ebu

eb

out (of), off, (away) from

Kebri eupte 'outside Kebri'

cezu

cez

against, despite

z'aiz'ega ceuste 'against the marriage'

foru

for

behind, in back of

keda fourte 'behind the house'

fuzu

fu

without

s'emu fuuste 'without a fish'

mitu

mi

with, using; supporting

abaz'e miutte 'with a knife'

nevu

ne

in the middle of, among, through, during

nabira neufte 'in the middle of the ship', mur neufte 'for an hour'

ponu

po

below, under

broga pounte 'under the table'

s'adamu

s'ada

far (from)

pol s'adaunte 'far from the city'

s'amu

s'a

around, surrounding, near

turgul s'aunte 'surrounding the battalion'

vekru

vek

as, like

gauryr vekurte 'like a virgin'

zinu

zi

in, inside, at, on(general locative)

lah' ziunte 'in the field', men ziunte 'on top of the hill', thiron ziunte 'at market'

zadinu

zadi

containing, including

seth zadiunte 'containing a jewel'

Time metaphorically flows not forward but downward in Kebreni:

mur dyunte an hour ago (lit., up an hour)
mur pounte an hour later, after one hour (lit., down an hour)

One can flow with a river or against it; expressions of support work the same way.

Tama miutte with (down) the Serea
Tama ceuste against (up) the Serea
melah' miutte/ceuste for/against the king

Adverbial conjunctions

Melah' zinu ingarei eh'c ingareu zinu h'yr.The king is in the tavern, and the tavernkeeper is in the castle.

H'ilu inga ga ingarei ziunte s'aida nyne diru.Either he likes the wine, or a beautiful girl works in the tavern.

Other relations between sentences are expressed by more specialized conjunctions. These are often expressed by adverbial clauses in English. Thus English adverb X (adverb) Y becomes X (conj) Y in Kebreni:

Melah' kaaryru pema falau yh'eryvu h'ithane.When the king returns, you will give him your sword.

Melah' kaurte natu hez' falau oteryru h'iitiru.If the king does not return, (then) you will take his sash.

H'em h'ouz'i kriida immi konarei mengu.Because I lost the mortgage document, the bank is whining.

The conjunction is considered to modify the first (X) clause. To second clause can however be fronted if a demonstrative is left in its place:

Konarei mengu, h'em h'ouz'i gemes'ate kriida immi kurite. The bank is whining, because I lost the mortgage document.

"To do X in order to Y" is expressed by placing X in the volitional and subordinating Y:

Alamaute aeladu. get-money-SUB spend-money-VOL
In order to get money, you must spend money.

Z'yunte Kebropol h'em oteru lore.go-SUB Kebropol I acquire-VOL horse
I want to get a horse in order to get to Kebropol.

Relative clauses

As noted under Pronouns, interrogative pronouns cannot be used as relative clauses (that is, to form subordinate clauses).

Where English would use 'what', 'who' 'where', or 'when', Kebreni uses the subordinating form of the verb:

This selection, from a newspaper article by S'enum Polyr, shows the typical romantic, slightly defensive Kebreni patriotism. It is given in transliteration with an interlinear translation, then in a free English translation.

In the interlinear translation, for brevity, I've used the English possessive or gerundive to represent subordinating forms of nouns and verbs, respectively. However, I've used verbal forms to translate locative verbs; prepositions would misrepresent the structure of Kebreni.

Writing addressed to the world in general (stories, essays, textbooks, news articles) generally does not use the polite forms. When the writer has a specific audience in mind (speeches, petitions, personal letters, sermons), polite forms are used. They are not used in religious language or in legal documents--not signs of disrespect for gods or negotiation partners, but of the age of such language, predating the grammaticalization of politeness.

Inside and outside

Think of Kebri. What do you think of? You think of the shadows on the valleys, the hills carpeted by olive trees, the sound of the sea lapping against boats. You see in your mind the proud cities, with their shipbuilders and banks and taverns, hear the sadness and glory of Kebreni songs, feel the long hair of beautiful Kebreni girls, taste the particular cheese made in your own valley or island--the best on Kebri. You think all this because you are Kebreni.

To the Verdurians, Kebri means these things: wine, olive oil, ships-- and enmity. We are the land which burned the Arcaln Bridge, the land that trades with Dhekhnam, the rival before the king of Moreo Ashcai. And at the same time, somehow, we make the finest wine in the world, better and richer than that that of Célenor or Luyshor.

It is the same way with each one of us. We see ourselves as a world-- a jumbled mixture of irreducible experience. Outsiders see us in caricature-- but may also see what we do not see: the drunkard never thinks he drinks too much. Neither point of view is the correct one; with human things, there is no objective viewpoint.

There are also many calques (loan-translations) from Cadhinor or Verdurian, such as babate namar for 'galena', from mira plomei 'mother of lead'; or zibis'u for 'entail', from imfayir, both formed from 'in' + 'be necessary'; or miebeu for 'disciple', 'one who leaves in support of (his beliefs)', based on profäsec; or mitecau for 'company', based on cumbutát 'those with a common goal'.